Weekly Radio Report: Civil Rights; Congressional Activities; & the Wheat Referendum

Item

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c031_027.mp3

c031_027_tr.txt

Transcription (Scripto)

Read Full Text Online (TXT)

Extent (Dublin Core)

5 Minutes, 49 Seconds

File Name (Dublin Core)

c031_027

Title (Dublin Core)

Weekly Radio Report: Civil Rights; Congressional Activities; & the Wheat Referendum

Description (Dublin Core)

Congressman Bob Dole begins his weekly radio broadcast discussing what Congress has accomplished in the last few months. He states that wheat legislation is of the utmost importance to people in Kansas, but that it does not get the attention it needs from U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Orville Freeman and the Democrats. He ends the broadcast talking about Civil Rights and the related legislation that Congress is working on.

Date (Dublin Core)

1963-07-19

Date Created (Dublin Core)

1963-07-20

Congress (Dublin Core)

88th (1963-1965)

Topics (Dublin Core)

See all items with this valueWheat farmers

See all items with this valueCivil rights

See all items with this valueAgricultural laws and legislation

Policy Area (Curation)

Agriculture and Food

Civil Rights and Liberties, Minority Issues

Creator (Dublin Core)

Dole, Robert J., 1923-2021

Record Type (Dublin Core)

radio programs

Names (Dublin Core)

See all items with this valueFreeman, Orville L.

Rights (Dublin Core)

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/CNE/1.0/

Language (Dublin Core)

eng

Collection Finding Aid (Dublin Core)

https://dolearchivecollections.ku.edu/index.php?p=collections/findingaid&id=84&q=

Physical Collection (Dublin Core)

Collection 031, Box 1

Institution (Dublin Core)

Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS

Archival Collection (Dublin Core)

Dole Audio Reels Collection, 1960-1979

Full Text (Extract Text)

This is Congressman Bob Dole with my weekly radio report from Washington. Again I wish to thank this station for carrying my weekly program as a public service broadcast, and again — as I have in the past — I would urge you to write your congressman and to let us know how you feel about the issues pending before Congress.

And let me state while we're talking about issues before Congress, that we've already spent over six and a half months in Congress, and it seems that we've accomplished very little, as far as I'm concerned. What have we done since January? And you as a taxpayer, of course, have the right to know. We've extended the draft, we have increased the national debt, and — of course — we'll have to increase this again later on, perhaps in August or September. We have provided a law which assures women equal pay for equal work, we have passed that so-called ‘Boiled Peanut Bill’ — which was very insignificant - we have passed some appropriation measures, and we have extended excise taxes, and by and large this is about all we've done.

We did pass the political administration feed grain program prior to the wheat referendum, and this is about all we've accomplished with reference to farm legislation. What is left to be done? Of course, there are those who want dairy legislation, those who want wheat legislation, and those who want cotton legislation — at least this is true in our committee. And as a member of the Agriculture Committee, these seem to be the things that are most pressing at this time. We have had hearings before our wheat subcommittee. Frankly, members of the majority party tell us there's no great interest in wheat legislation. I certainly feel that Secretary [of Agriculture] Freeman's departure from this country on a visit to the five communist countries — and the fact he will not return until August 12th — must be construed to be at least an indication, a lack of any official interest by this Administration in new wheat legislation. Because Secretary Freeman, of course, does occupy the highest position in this Administration with reference to agriculture, and I do not see how we can construe his absence in any other way. And as I have said before, even though some of us may disagree with Freeman at times — and sometimes you may think we agree with him every time — he does have the responsibility as Secretary, at least to discuss the programs and to appear before our committees and give us his views. And certainly the wheat farmers of Western Kansas need to know now, and not sometime later on this year in November or December before they are told what the program will be, if any. As I told Secretary Freeman when he was before our family farm subcommittee about two weeks ago, I felt the farmers wanted to know one way or the other: will the administration recommend new legislation or will they say the referendum decided this — there'll be noted legislation? I think once a farmer knows for sure what will happen, he can then make plans accordingly. This is no time to play games with the farmer, and certainly I feel, that something definite should be decided and stated in the very near future.

We are having hearings as I said originally, but frankly I'm not certain what may come from these hearings. Twenty members of the minority, the Republican Party, introduced legislation on May 23rd; I was one of these. It's sort of a middle-of-the-road approach to the wheat and feed grain problem. It combines wheat and feed grain acreage and gives the farmer the discretion and the option of deciding whether to plant wheat or whether to plant feed grains. It is a voluntary program: it does provide payments for land diversion, and it does contain flexible price supports, but it is the voluntary-type program that the farmers indicate to me they want, in their mail. And I would say up until now, we’ve had somewhere in the neighborhood of 350 or 400 letters from farmers since the referendum, and while there is no clear pattern developing, the one thing that stands out is that farmers do want a voluntary program.

Now there has been some talk about adjournment — some talk about it's no longer a question of when we adjourn, but a question of if we'll adjourn this year. And of course this speculation is based on what will happen in the area of Civil Rights. Certainly in Kansas, where we've made great progress in the area of Civil Rights, we recognize that every citizen is entitled to equal rights, but with it we recognize something else, and that is why we must not talk about rights for anybody regardless of race, color, or creed, without some discussion of equal responsibilities. And I think discussing rights without discussing responsibilities, or discussing responsibilities without discussing rights actually begs the question, and I'm certainly hopeful that when this matter comes to the floor of the House and to the Senate, that we will consider both rights and responsibilities regardless of race, color, or creed, because to me this is the keystone of any successful program.

I see that our time is up and again I thank you for listening. If you have questions contact me, Congressman Bob Dole. Room 244, House Office Building, Washington 25 D.C.